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Wenger: This team has right mentality to win title

Arsene Wenger accepts it will be difficult for Arsenal to overhaul two teams in the Premier League title race but believes his players have the right mentality to do so.

Arsenal are some 11 points behind Leicester City at the top of the table, albeit with a game in hand, after the Foxes held on for a 1-0 win over Southampton on Sunday.

The Gunners thrashed Watford 4-0 at Emirates Stadium the day before to make it back-to-back league wins, but they may need to extend that winning streak right until the end of the season if they are to win the title.

Wenger, however, believes there are the right ingredients for a late surge.

“To go on a later run, you need to find a team who clicks at the right moment,” he said in the Daily Mail. “(For that) Sometimes you have all kinds of reasons: because your injured players come back like [Danny] Welbeck, because of the emergence of some players like [Alex] Iwobi.

“In 1998 we had a game in hand and suddenly we had a good run.

“We played at Wimbledon and the electricity went off, the game was cancelled and we won when it was replayed, we won at Man United, and suddenly everybody thought it was possible.

“Unfortunately this time we have to fight with two teams. But before we speak about that we have to show we can sustain a strong run.

“I feel the technical quality of our game and the pace of our game is good. That’s a good basis.

“We have to be realistic and just prepare for the next game and not dream too much. We have suffered recently and that will help us to keep the focus.

“We have only one target now. And as well, we always go through difficult periods and in the end the teams who do well are the team who continue to perform and continue to get results even when the period is a bit more difficult. I believe this team has the right mentality.

“I have had many teams in my life and this team is top quality. They have gone through a bad period but when they play like that, it shows that mentally, they are pure.”